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Independence or Barbarism

By Mike Small

John Swinney isn’t Che Guevara. Angus Robertson isn’t Slavoj Žižek.

Owen Paterson, the famously climate-denialist Environment Minister may be disappointed to hear that after his bizarre rant in the Independent‘SNP are Marxists’– but it is the thin end of the wedge of apocalyptic reactions to the Scottish results.

It’s testimony to the bizarre misjudgement of the entire political class, their pollsters and their media.

It would be a mistake to confuse Owen Paterson with ‘England’ – his party governs with the backing of only 24% of registered voters. So the crisis of legitimacy is not purely a Scottish phenomenon, but it is enhanced as a Scottish phenomenon because we backed a party running on an anti-austerity, anti-Trident, anti-House of Lords message of hope and solidarity.

In other words while you can’t characterise English opinion as being represented by Owen Paterson, its not represented by the anti-Tory protestors either. In fact the only thing more annoying than a massive anti-Tory demo after a massive Tory victory is a massive SNP victory after an indyref defeat.

It’s just a fragment of the bigger picture that is dawning on us all, the actual reality of what a five year term will mean, who these people are and what they represent.

The influential French thinker Cornelius Castoriadis used to write about the idea of ‘Socialisme ou Barbarie’ in the 50s and 60s. It’s becoming clearer and clearer that we need to show solidarity with, and make connections with the radical movements across these islands and across Europe (and to our north in Iceland). It’s clear too that while we build these networks of resistance we need to move on with developing a strategy for independence. This is a movement task not a party political task because we face independence or barbarism.

The relationship between the ’45’ and the ’56’ is now crucial.

In times like this political reality moves at lightning speed. The commentariat are asking mostly the wrong questions.

As Scottish Labour descends into an entertaining fratricide the question isn’t ‘Who Should Replace Jim Murphy?’ – it’s – ‘Who Cares?’ And ditto for the Head Office job.

Are we really all supposed to feign interest in Andy Burnham or give credence to the toe-curling idea of David Miliband being shuttled back across the Atlantic in some kind of orgy of unreconstructed Blairite regurgitative loopery?

“..the 1707 union between England and Scotland is already dead. As a piece of architecture, it was abandoned in 1999, when the devolved Scottish parliamentmet. Rain blew in as slates fell off; pews were looted; and the Holyrood elections of 2007 and 2011 brought down more of the roof. Last week Alex Salmond said he heard the Scottish lion roaring. I heard the rumble as the union’s floor gave way and fell into the crypt.”

Whilst the metaphor of collapsing architecture works for me, I also want to work with people to create new buildings in a new Scotland, and tomorrow we’ll announce ambitious plans to do that.

Advancing work on a written constitution for an independent Scotland
Working from now on a Green/SNP alliance to drive Labour out of Glasgow City Council
Things are going to be shit for the vulnerable in the next 5 years……as well as being politically active we need to offer our time and talents to help those who will suffer from turbo charged austerity

Excellent post. Quick question does anyone think there might be benefits for left of centre politics in the UK if there was a pro-EU group, SNP, Greens, Plaid, LIb Dem, Labour campaigning to stay in during the EU referendum rather like Yes did? Or is that too depressing to contemplate?

People are naturally angry and hurt that the tories have gained power, but this guy is one of the reasons why Cameron will soon rue the day he got his second ministry. I genuinly believe that the Tories will rapidly make themselves unelectable for a decade. It might not seem that way, but they have such a razor thin majority that they are going to be prone to rebellions and mischief – particularly now with the Fixed Term Parliaments Act when rebellions don’t mean that the government falls.

You are right, novacaledonia. The Tories have picked up a poisoned chalice and their victory is an illusion. Their greed, selfishness and cruelty will bring them down. There is fear in their faces already.

Can I just sound a not of caution? Cameron and the Tories were pencilled in for oblivion after the last election – once people realised what they were really going to do. I remember writers in the Grauniad prophesying that they would soon be the most unpopular government in history and would be turfed out in favour of the right-on left wing Miliband party. I thought at the time this was wishful thinking.

Well, they’ve hammered the poor etc but they have brain-washed much of the electorate into believing their economically illiterate characterisation of the financial crisis and the deficit/debt syndrome. Plus Miliband never seemed a credible leader, their manifesto was seen as little different from the Tory’s and they failed to explain the banking crash and to apologise for landing the tax payer for the bill while allowing bankers to continue as normal without restriction and without paying the price.

Absolutely, broadbield. The right-wing press will be (even) less relevant in five years time, but their owners will extend their tentacles to social media to maintain their influence.

Influence is, of course, what it is all about as the business model for the press is not something that would otherwise detain rapacious billionaires. Even if people don’t buy it, the pictures and headlines are prominent in every newsagent and general store throughout the land, screeching “STURGEON IS A HYPOCRITE” or somesuch, juxtaposed by a picture of the Queen looking concerned. Subliminal ploys like that assault us all the time, reinforced by the BBC et al who follow the political news agenda set by the press, or in the case of Sky actually co-ordinate campaigns.

Yes, I think the blue fruit loops will crucify Cameron egged on by the impatient ambitions of Bojo who is already conniving to replace his Bullingdon buddy in 2017. If, however, there is anything less than coherent opposition from Labour, if Chuka Umunna or Yvette Cooper or whoever triangulates their party into New New Labour or Tory Lite brands, then it may not matter greatly to the alienated working classes of England or anywhere else.

Couple of things that might play in the Left’s favour are the death and/or decrepitude of Mrs Windsor, replaced by the unpopular Charlie or, far more significantly, if the lid blows on the parliamentary paedophile ring and its myriad cover-ups. Trust in Parliament, shaky as it is, would simply collapse altogether, as happened in Belgium. Indeed Neal Ascherson’s metaphor of a crumbling Palace of Westminster may be far more apt than we realise.

For that reason I would respectfully suggest that once the SNP MPs find their feet they put together a small team from its ranks – say a lawyer, a journalist and a medico – to ally with Tom Watson and use every privilege their status affords them to pursue the truth of the systematic acquisition, rape and murder of vulnerable children by the great and the good of the British State. And if Alex Salmond can get himself on the committee overseeing the security services, perhaps the depths of the abuse of “national security” over these crimes – and others – may finally be revealed. The consquent loss of faith in the institutions would detonate the dynamite under not just this Tory government but the entire rotten structure.

THere are 24 UK Govt ministries plus the PMs office & deputy PM.
Divide up ALL our 56 by giving each one responsibilities to shadow specific ministers & their junior ministers.
Form a shadow cabinet using the entire team.
Let no Tory Minister or junior attempt to inflict hardship or austerity or any form of anti-progressive measure without an SNP shadow opposing vigorously any such anti-people measures.
Let the 56 get in the face of the Govt- and out perform any other opposition in defending working people from ruthless Tory oppression.
Use the system to demonstrate an alternative set of options showing another way forward.
Let Westminster know that the SNP are a serious,determined, conscious political movement.

I am English, live in Hull and never voted Tory in my life, never will. I totally agree with the sentiments that the UK PM adopted outrageous campaign tactics in his insulting approach to Scotland and Scottish voters. Sadly, he appears to have succeeded to the English middle englanders who only care about the size of their own bank balances, as well as blame all ills of the world on immigrants and/or the EU. As you rightly say they are a small minority of English voters, they are the spawn of Thatcher and have nothing in common with me and many people who live in my city. Since the results i have heard so many here say ‘we want to live in Scotland’ and ‘I wish we could vote SNP’.
People down here are so angry at the selfish little englanders who have ensured their own lifestyles by not giving a damn about anyone else, the sick, disabled, vulnerable and all of the public services including education and the NHS that are being decimated by this vermin.
I fully agree that irrespective of the future of this so called United Kingdom, anyone who opposes all the Tories stand for must unite and respond in kind with every policy they put out that attacks the weakest in society. Somehow we must organise and unite.
No doubt Blair stole the Labour party and began turning it Tory, I would call myself an old fashioned socialist, something Blair, Mandelson and a large proportion of what is called Labour, would baulk at. They insult the memory of all of those who created the Labour movement and people like Atlee and Bevan, who introduced genuine socialist policies straight after the second war, at a time of austerity.
I feel the majority the Tories now hold and their inbuilt arrogance and sense of privilege might just be their downfall. Of course the downfall of the Tories is only one element for those here in England, it is what is there as an alternative? That question remains the big problem for the mass of people here in England.

I think they fielded a few candidates last week, but they have no significance at all. The party’s so small that they can get the entire audience at their AGM in one photo, or, to borrow one of Jasper Carrott’s old footie-related gags, they announce the crowd changes to the team.

Would a nation that conquered half the globe be duped by spin doctors telling them that if they voted labour, they”d get SNP controlling the uk?

My opinion is no, the English were not duped. They made a conscious decision to vote tory to exclude any possibility of Scottish influence on the running of the uk. N.B. brown and blair are not Scottish, they are british.

They cut off their noses to spite their faces or kicked the support out from under their sick and poor in doing so, I find this is truly barbaric behaviour.

What confuses me is why do the tories wish to keep hold of Scotland other than to maintain face internationally? Oil and grouse moors help explain some economic and social reasons.

I disagree with novacaledonia, tories will muddle through, no matter what. major and latterly what happened to their coalition pals demonstrate the self preservation and utter ruthlessness that ensures wealth goes to wealth.

labour have huge problems, – Scotland, – non raison d’être, – electoral arithmetic due to boundary changes, – split three ways geographically and on political positioning,, – no experienced leader in waiting, – ukip nibbling at their vote, – unions / funding drifting away – and a voter perception that incompetence runs deep in every aspect of the party.

liberals are finished, they have non raison d’être either. Any new members since Thursday will be old supporters and a fanciful revival of remembrance of things past, this is not new or young blood, therefore only of short term financial benefit, not sustainable in long term.

As far as SNP, the future is so bright we will have to wear shades! Referendum to be at a time of our choosing, possibly dictated by EU decisions and a tory government in the stew due to internal rebellion.

I am genuinely sad labour could not hold England, I am not surprised, I am sure the SNP leadership had formulated options on the possible outcomes. I am sad from the point we could have helped the poor and needy both sides of the border by asserting pressure on a mailable labour Party.

Post that labour party to Russia
Seriously agree,Except for Novacaledonia’s Hope over fear assertions that Conservatives will implode when Ian Duncan Smith,Gove etc.see through Cameron’s Career [Country] changing result.
Landing the poison Chalice positions onto less able politicians,while he swans off to foreign clime’s.
By the way,Huffington Post did a nice video of Cameron’.s Freudian slip.
Country-Career changing indeed.

John,
Then get as many as you can to push, no, demand that your non Tory MP’s to support any anti austerity demands made by the SNP in Westminster. While you understand I am sure, that we want Independence, we would also like to help the ordinary people of England, who have and will continue austerity thrust upon them. You will of course not hear that in the English right wing press, however, it is the truth..
The corrupt system needs exposed, and for this to get desired results, we all have to start somewhere.

The winds of change are blowing, last years referendum did one thing, it helped us define a better idea of what it means to be Scottish not just “we`re not English” now we`ve come to terms with the past and we`ve moved on to building a future, but they can`t see that especial Labour to busy trying to get their snouts in Westminster`s trough, let them while their guarding the chickens we`ll steal the eggs. Saor Alba.

Take heart, reasonable people of all nationalities, the Tory position is not sustainable for it contains the seeds of its own destruction. Vast grass-roots forces of protest are stirring and you can see the worry in those previously smug Tory faces. They know they have connived their way into what is only a a Pyrrhic victory and are holding a poisoned chalice. Their greed and selfishness will be their undoing.

In her rare visits to Scotland during the election campaign, Nicola Sturgeon became visibly dismayed by the growing level of expectation of the SNP among the voters. There are two responses to the problem of great expectations: try to live up to them, or manage them downwards. Clearly as a competent career politician, Ms Sturgeon chose the latter. In the space of two days she has expertly reduced her support in Scotland by at least a half by abandoning independence and joining the enemy.
In the midst of the latest Establishment celebrations of war, senior SNP policymakers have promised that the 56 MPs will become ‘firmly imbedded in the Westminster Establishment’. (Code for gravy train) In that case, what will the 45% make of them? Snaw-affa-dyke? And what is the SNP branch office in Holyrood going to do?
I do hope that Bella Caledonia plans will come to the rescue, because we have been outrageously betrayed by our politicians.
Bill

Your two options theory is flawed, The First Minster “managed expectations”‘ not up, down or sideways, merely managed.

Reducing support and joining enemy, which ring on Mars do you inhabit?

Do you celebrate war dressed in black holding and laying a wreath, must be Pluto you live on?

No promise was provided to embed within westminster, end to austerity, furtherance of Scotland”s people’s needs and independence is still our aim, not part of the establishment”s agenda as far as I deduce.

Your references to Holyrood, betray your allegiance!

Bill, put your teeth in and glasses on, look around you, your beloved labour has had its comeupence, Scotland is on the road to freedom. You can of course vote with your feet and move South, the benefits of that are you can visit Scotland and see how a country not subject to the incompetentce of labour prospers! Don”t be so sure about obtaining a Scottish passport, we have to draw the line somewhere!

The sad thing is that 5 years is a fair bit of time for the tories and their ilk to fill their coffers to compensate for any lean time in the future. As for Scotland they want only to control our resources and trident positioning(if you pardon the pun:its not rocket science).

What an extraordinarily gullible and naïve lot you are. All hell-bent on your Braveheart ambitions to take the 50% of sensible Scots who didn’t vote SNP, with you down the economically ruinous path to an IMF bail-out. Certainly hope the English won’t be called upon to do so…

Feel so sorry for my many Scottish friends South of the border, who shake their heads in collective disbelief at what the SNP are doing to their homeland.

“gullible and naïve” would be to leave the future governance of Scotland to Westminster. I suspect most English folk will welcome their independence when Cameron announces he is ‘casting adrift Scotland’.

It is not what the SNP are doing to the country that your friends left behind, it is what the majority of the people of Scotland voted to happen.
I think you should be more concerned for the sensible +70% of Brits who did not vote for this Tory administration.

Scotland won’t be on any path to economic ruin for the simple reason that, unlike the rUK, we are a net exporting country. i.e. we continually add wealth to our national economy rather than lose it. Detractors often say the oil will run out, and so it will, but it is the revenue from oil that has stopped the UK economy from failing for decades. Scotland needs to put together a programme of investment for when that happens and our politicians know and understand that. The UK seem content to believe that as long they leave the EU and stop immigration then an economy based on financial services and a population on minimum wage selling each other frothy coffee will be enough.

Well, Nick.The question arises, why are they down there in England? Perhaps they can earn enough down there to bring up a family and pay a mortgage where they couldn’t in Scotland. Having left, they couldn’t care less for the chances of those they left behind. It’s the ‘I’m all right, Jock’ syndrome again.
I spent 24 years of my life down there, leaving elderly parents less and less able to look after themselves. I gave employment to 30 people, in both setting up and running a chemical processing plant and then setting up my own. I would have liked to have done the same in Scotland, but the salary I was offered was derisory.
The emigres would rather vote for a corrupt, self-serving bunch of warmongering, incompetent career politicians who are working only for self-advancement. They (the politicians) are the ones who have broken up Britain, not the Scots. We have just had enough of them and a party elected here for 50 years that has done nothing for Scotland, and takes the southern English whip on policy regardless of how it hurts their country.
How long did they think that they could continue to increase the geographical difference in prosperity between north and south without some kind of political rebellion? Labour didn’t care as long as they were living in the lap of luxury amongst it all, claiming their generous expenses and keeping their noses clean for an ermine retirement. I’m glad to see that it didn’t work out for them.
We have seen this Tory government elected by default through the laziness of an incompetent, complacent Labour party. The inequalities will widen. There is talk of reducing taxes for the already rich (disbanding the 50% tax rate) to ‘encourage entrepreneurship’. The ‘entrepreneurial’ rich will take advantage of the next big privatisation going cheap, hold on to the shares for a while and make a killing selling them. Short-term buck making for those with the spare readies – nothing for those who need every penny to live. The population will get absolutely zilch for a public company/organisation that it has been taxed to support for years. As reward for all this, the Tories will eventually get lucrative sinecures on company boards, their uselessness ignored, but their erstwhile contacts in government used. Ugh, I wish we had a Labour Party with backbone!

Chuka Umunna who?! He has risen without trace even in England. Is he being promoted…jus’ ‘cos he’s black? Well Labour have tried everything else. Why don’t they try solid left wing policies to win back N England and the workers in S and W England.

Chuka Umunna is a real man of the people. Proper working class traditional Labour. I read a magazine profile about him only a few weeks ago where he said (without any apparent intention of irony) that he believes he has an advantage over other politician because his ten years working as a corporate lawyer means he understands what life is like for ordinary working people. No doubt he was the shop steward for the Amalgamated Union of Corporate Executives, Lawyers and Financiers at his law firm too.

Jacques – “solid left wing policies”!!! I seriously believe that socialism must be a gene rather than a belief. Why else like groundhog day would you opt for radical socialism when time and again it has failed the UK.

Every socialist government since Ramsay McDonald has failed the UK economy and the Tories have had to come back and clear up the mess. You really don’t understand it and never apologise for it; one very good reason why the electorate South of the border rejected Miliband and his remarkably inept cohorts.

Do you believe it would be any different in an independent Scotland?

Or are you perhaps one of the many SNP voters who voted for an SNP satellite government within the protective arms of UK responsibility.

NB – this is not a troll as you put it – just someone posing a different view.

Economic failure in the UK is entirely down to Westminster mismanagement over a very long period of time.
Norway took about the same amount of oil revenues from the North Sea as London and now owns 1% of global equity funds as a direct result.
Westminster managed to turn that windfall into a £1.5 trillion pile of debt.
It hasn’t mattered what shade of government England has elected to it’s parliament because the outcome is always the same.
Economic decline.

I’m afraid Nick that you have neither understanding of economics nor history. In 1930 the debt to GDP stood at 200% the then Tory government went into austerity and caused the collapse of the UK economy until rearmament reflated the economy. In 1951 after 6 years of crisis post war labour government the debt was 130% ushering in the longest sustained growth in our history. Currently the government debt is 80% of GDP, (up from the usual 40% since the banking crisis). However private debt is 250% of GDP which is pressing down on demand. Austerity and private debt are responsible for the recession and it’s only hidden reflation in areas such as housing that keep the governments policy afloat.

I see also that 0% of Scottish squirrels voted SNP. How can the SNP speak for them? I mean, it’s not right, it’s a scandal, something must be done, there must be a full public inquiry, etc, etc, ad infinitum, ad nauseam, from everlasting to everlasting, world without end, amen.

Never doubted or questioned the ability of SNP to speak for Scottish squirrels…in fact if they confined their policies to squirrels only they might actually do some good. My point was that if you question the legitimacy of the conservative government based on its % of registered voters then if you use the same metric the SNP are hardly shining paragons democratic accountability either

“The cynic in me detects a conscious mimicking of Obama’s consensual approach – and see how warmly welcomed that was received by the Republicans.”

Only the cynic in you? I am absolutely certain he is being put forward by Labour as “Little Obama” for the UK. Everything he says and is said about him reminds me of the bullshit said by him and about Obama before his first stint. And look at what has happened.

Hardly a breath of fresh air just standard propaganda and another member of the cult of business for business sake. You not doubt bang on about public debt to GDP ratio but never seem concerned that private debt to GDP ratio is at 300% and whose to blame for that?

The Tories think its 1979 and Labour wanna go back to 1997 but they forget that due to their combined efforts we have sold off every collective asset in the UK and placed major companies in the hands of global finance and at the end of it all we are £1.5 trillion in debt and manufacture the square root of fuck all.

So lets elect a chancellor whose senior economic advisor is a crackheid, create a property bubble(steal housing association assets/ redirect pension money to property rental market)keep on making money from nothing (London) and carry on to the next financial crisis via conflict in Ukraine and possibly under 3 feet o’ flood water.

If any ism that is not beholden to the economic miracle is a gene then the Business cult must be a virus,

Indeed Hilton. And Nick will correct me if I’m wrong, but I think it was socialism that brought us the welfare state and public ownership. And before you scream that the State is inefficient, read some of the academic works which demonstrate that is untrue. And consider this also, there is hardly an iota of technology in the iPhone which doesn’t depend on State funded and developed research. The big mistake is that the State has handed over all the profits to corporate interests, hence Apples huge warchest of cash.

Voted SNP and go with most of what they are about “indy” in particular but I am leaning more to the “commonweal” philosophy about creating a whole new world concerning how we want our children to work/learn/live.We have to radically bring in policies that will benefit all of us so that there are fewer divisions,we shouldn,t be arguing about this % or that% we are a small nation and the less divisions the better.I believe that we should nationalise the utilities,transport/energy/banks e.t.c with a view to reducing the load on business and by dint helping them to take on more workers,we could also make housing more affordable therefore putting more money into the hands of people this will impact on business,we have to get away from the failed system that continues to deny ordinary folks the advantage of having some extra to apen instead of always letting only the few this luxury.Surely with all the land we have small farm holdings could be encouraged to produce all sorts of good healthy food creating employment for lots of the dis-enfranchised,this would give many a new lease of life.The old model has failed so many for so long we must change or die.

The Scottish Labour party have spent the last 35 years claiming to be a Unionist party but have instead spent that time stating that Scotland should be some sort of socialist redoubt against the predatory English. Eventually those Labour voters realised there was a party who believed the same but wasn’t hypocritical enough to ask them to vote to preserve a Union the electoral consequences of which they had been denouncing for a generation.

So while it pains me to see the SNP as popular as they so obviously are, I am absolutely delighted that thanks to them the abomination that was the Scottish Labour Party has been exorcised from the Scottish body politic. Now the ideals of independance and unionism, socialism and free markets can be debated in an intellectually honest and hopefully respectful manner.

The rise of UKP and the calls for the Labour Party to move to the right and regain the success of New Labour all scare me a great deal. The hope of a fairer Scotland that raised such hope can never be achieved under the pressure of such a right wing drift.

Scotland is different. We care about our fellow man even as we try to better ourselves. I may enjoy the benefits of a larger house or a new car but that enjoyment is diminished when I read of foodbanks and welfare cuts.

I have always supported independence yet I recognised the concern of many Scots to make that step….However I ask them to consider the options now – what choice do we have?